I overstayed my residence permit for a whole year and I'm in desperate need for advice

I'm 22 years old and I came here to Germany in 2022 on a student visa and had my permit extended up until mid 2024 in 2023. The last time I extended my permit, I was told by the employee working there that I must get an acceptance from a university to extend my permit the next time I came.

However, this didn't work out for me. My parents insisted that I should only aim for a top university in Medicine and I was just unable to meet the language requirements and the stress from my failure just kept compounding.

I fell in a really deep downward spiral of depression. I come from a third world country with many issues (Libya) and an abusive household, so I was too scared to go back. I isolated myself from pretty much everyone and turned into a near-complete shut-in, and my physical and mental health deteriorated rapidly. I heavily considered suicide, so for a while my mind just blanked out and the crime I'm committing or any consequences that I could face just completely stopped mattering to me.

Of course, I'm well aware that none of this justifies what I did and this is still ultimately all my fault. 

I started putting things back together to some small extent recently. I got a couple of university acceptances for programs that are easier to get into and enrolled into one in hopes that I could use that to help my case even slightly. The problem is, I applied for an appointment to extend my residence, and recently, I received an email from the Ausländerbehörde that states:

"I expressly point out that anyone staying in Germany without a valid residence permit is committing a criminal offense, punishable by imprisonment of up to one year.

In your own interest, especially to avoid coercive measures under immigration law, I ask you to contact me."

I really don't know what to do at this point. Is a second chance completely out of the question? Or at the very least, is there any hope that I could lessen the severity of the consequences as much as possible? Or is this just an open-and-shut case?

Should I contact the person who sent me the email? Or hold off on responding and look for a lawyer? Or just leave the country on my own volition? (this is probably a bad idea, but I'm just putting it out there). Please, I would like as many perspectives on this matter as possible.

yes, you should contact the person. you basically have nothing to lose if you just call them. i mean, the situation could hardly become worse for you by just calling them. but they may be able to give you a perspective and work things out with you. ignoring them will make things definetely worse on the other hand. the wording of her mail sounds to me like she is willing to at least lessen the severity of the consequences.

you can still look out for a lawyer after contacting them.